Lisafuller wrote: ↑Mon, 20 Feb 2023 12:41 am
sundaymorningstaple wrote: ↑Sun, 19 Feb 2023 10:37 pm
Lisafuller wrote: ↑Sun, 19 Feb 2023 2:39 am
You really seem to have a military level of discipline.
Lisa, that actually caused a belly-laugh. Had I really had a military level of discipline I would have never started smoking. I didn't start smoking until almost 2 years after I came back from the NAM. I guess I was around 22 years of age when I started. I didn't start drinking until I was 27. But yes, I do have military level of discipline once I make up my mind. Flying a chopper in the NAM you better have discipline or your didn't come home.
Well yes, but smoking was huge back in the day. To quit cold turkey one random day and truly never come back to it takes commitment.
I don't know if this will make any sense but there was a definite thought process when I quit smoking. Around 1989 or 1990 I stopped smoking for about 18 months. Until I have my first major gout attack while on a drilling rig off the coast of Balikpapan. I was flown back to Singapore later that morning and was sent to the company's diving doctor who took a blood sample and then gave me an injection and informed me that I probably had gout. Well, it was gout and I spent the next 2 weeks sitting on the couch unable to walk and after 14 days it was "give me a goddam cigarette!" I actually stopped smoking due to pressure from the wife, kids, government, etc. etc. stayed clean for 18 months till then. Took me about a dozen more years before I decided to quit smoking.
There are two operative words to that story (it is all true). One is stop and the other is quit. The first is the reason I stopped the first time. (For all the wrong reasons). I liken it to driving a car. When you pull up to a traffic junction if the light is red you stop. Full Stop! But the instance the light turn green away you go again.
The 2nd instance I QUIT smoking. I actually quit in my mind before I stubbed it out after only two drags. Not for anybody else' reason but purely because "I" wanted to. To go back to my other simile it's like pulling up to a lot, parking the car and taking the keys out of the ignition and throwing them away. Stopping is temporary and is usually followed by go. Quit is a bit more final. It's a mind game I know but one I'm pretty good at.